Sociology of Sustainable Fashion and Clothing (5 cr)

Objective

• Students understand the connections between fashion, society, material/consumer culture in everyday life.
• Students become able to view fashion as a tool for catalyzing social and ecological change.
• Students will be able to demonstrate the ability to analyze, critique, and compare key concepts in fashion theory.
• Students will be equipped with rich knowledge enabling them to re-examine their own practices considering social, cultural and ecological issues addressed through the course.

Content

• Overview of classical and contemporary sociological theories to the study of fashion in light of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
• Fashion as; a symbolic and material object, a systemic phenomenon and as an embodied practice.
• Key concerns and issues in society and their relations with fashion and SDGs.
• Fashion’s links to individual, gender, cultural, ecological, and material identity.

Location and time

Online via Zoom on Tuesdays, 17:00 - 20:00 hrs: 10 September - 3 December 2024 (7 sessions).
Submission deadline for learning log: 17 December 2024.

Materials

Session 1: Introduction
No reading requirement/material for Session 1

Session 2: Fashion, class and sustainability
• Aspers, P., & Godart, F. (2013). Sociology of fashion: Order and change. Annual Review of Sociology, 39, 171-192.
• Otto von Busch (2022) “What is to be sustained?”: Perpetuating systemic injustices through sustainable fashion, Sustainability: Science, Practice and Policy, 18:1, 400-409, DOI: 10.1080/15487733.2022.2069996

Session 3: Fashion, well-being and sustainability
• Lauren Downing Peters (2014) You Are What You Wear: How Plus-Size Fashion Figures in Fat Identity Formation, Fashion Theory, 18:1, 45-71, DOI: 10.2752/175174114X13788163471668
• Thompson, H. A. (2022). Holistically embracing mindfulness: Enriching slow fashion for enhanced well-being. International Journal of Sustainable Fashion & Textiles, 1(1), 81-106.

Session 4: Fashion, gender and sustainability
• Entwistle, J., & Mears, A. (2013). Gender on display: Peformativity in fashion modelling. Cultural Sociology, 7(3), 320-335.
• Vijeyarasa, R., & Liu, M. (2022). Fast fashion for 2030: Using the pattern of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) to cut a more gender-just fashion sector. Business and Human Rights Journal, 7(1), 45-66.

Session 5: Fashion, race and sustainability
• Reddy-Best, K. L., Choi, E., & Park, H. (2018). Race, colorism, body size, body position, and sexiness: Critically analyzing women in fashion illustration textbooks. Clothing and Textiles Research Journal, 36(4), 281-295.
• Otto von Busch (2018) Inclusive Fashion—an Oxymoron—or a Possibility for Sustainable Fashion?, Fashion Practice, 10:3, 311-327

Session 6: Fashion, material culture and sustainability
• Woodward, S., & Fisher, T. (2014). Fashioning through materials: Material culture, materiality and processes of materialization. Critical Studies in Fashion & Beauty, 5(1), 3-23.
• Willett, J., Saunders, C., Hackney, F., & Hill, K. (2022). The affective economy and fast fashion: Materiality, embodied learning and developing a sensibility for sustainable clothing. Journal of Material Culture, 27(3), 219-237.

Session 7: Fashion, social media and sustainability
• Karen de Perthuis & Rosie Findlay (2019): How Fashion Travels: The Fashionable Ideal in the Age of Instagram, Fashion Theory
• McKeown, C., & Shearer, L. (2019). Taking sustainable fashion mainstream: Social media and the institutional celebrity entrepreneur. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 18(5), 406-414.

Teaching methods

Online teaching and independent study (reading articles, group presentations, learning log):

The course will be using online teaching through Zoom and take a flipped classroom learning approach. This will enable deep learning and active student engagement with the various topics covered in the course.

With the exception of session 1, all sessions will be divided into two parts. The first half of the session will include a lecture overviewing the concepts that are introduced in the readings. Then we take a break and in the second half students will be paired up in groups and given the chance to present their reflections on the topic of the day. This will also include taking real life examples of companies and examining them in light of the assigned reading material. The core aim is to encourage independent and critical thinking through discussion and debate.

Employer connections

-

Exam schedules

-

International connections

-

Completion alternatives

-

Student workload

1 cr = ca 27 h student work
5 cr = 135 h

Online teaching 15 h
Reflection and thinking 30 h
Self-evaluation 5 h
Independent study: Reading articles 40 h, Group presentation 15 h, Learning log 30 h

Content scheduling

Schedule: Every Tuesdays, 17:00 - 20:00

Session 1: Introduction: 10 September 2024
Session 2: Fashion, class and sustainability: 24 September 2024
Session 3: Fashion, well-being and sustainability: 8 October 2024
Session 4: Fashion, gender and sustainability: 22 October 2024
Session 5: Fashion, race and sustainability: 5 November 2024
Session 6: Fashion, material culture and sustainability: 19 November 2024
Session 7: Fashion, social media and sustainability: 3 December 2024
Submission deadline for learning log: 17 December 2024

Further information

SOCIOLOGY OF SUSTAINABLE FASHION AND CLOTHING

“If you look at any great fashion photograph out of context, it will tell you just as much about what's going on in the world as a headline in The New York Times.” - Anna Wintour

This course is an introduction to the sociology of sustainable fashion and clothing. Students will engage in studying fashion and clothing from a sociological lens. Each session will bring attention to a different sociological aspect present within the practice and phenomenon of fashion with the eventual aim of critically examining the extent to which various SDGs address these tenets of a sociology of sustainable fashion.

Session one will begin by introducing students to the aims of the course, course content, important deadlines, reading materials and assignments.

Session two will explore how fashion has traditionally been understood as a means of creating and sustaining class hierarchies within societies.
We will then examine sustainable fashion practices in this light to explore if sustainability driven fashion addresses or perpetuates class differences and elitism in societies?

In session three our focus will shift to the works of contemporary scholars that explore fashion as a symbolic medium of expression and the role it plays in influencing understandings of the self and body-image. We will continue to examine the possibilities slow fashion practices might provide in creating body positivity and well-being .

Session four till seven will examine how fashion is used to construct and even challenge societal understandings of ethnicity, race and material culture and critically examine how these aspects are represented in sustainable fashion practices (in particular certain SDGs).
Participation in the course will enable students to create a revised understanding of what it means to be a designer in the 21st century by examining the dual nature of designers as agents that shape sustainable fashion practices and also get shaped by larger sociological and structural forces that encompass global fashion and clothing practices.

I welcome you to the course and look forward to meeting you all!
Dr. Marium Durrani, Lecturer

Evaluation scale

Hyväksytty/Hylätty

Assessment criteria, approved/failed

The student is able to describe the connections between fashion, society, material/consumer culture in everyday life and identifies the key concerns and issues in society and their relations with fashion and SDGs. The student is aware of contemporary and classical sociological theories to the study of fashion and is able to demonstrate the ability to analyze, critique, and compare key concepts in fashion theory. The student has completed the assigned tasks and participated in learning situations.

Assessment methods and criteria

Grade breakdown:
Presentation 50%
Learning log 50%: submission deadline December 17th, 2024

Qualifications

Completed Higher Education Degree. Level of the study unit: Masters; level 7 in the Finnish National Framework for Qualifications (FiNQF).

Further information

The language of tuition is English. The level of the study unit is Masters; level 7 in the Finnish National Framework for Qualifications (FiNQF).